Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-07-02

we have taken care to make our errors
teach us wisdom. Who could spare their
sorrows? How much that is kind and
sympathetic in our natures, which lead us
to minister TO the grief of others, and
thus to gain consultations for ourselves,
grow out of what are felt as keen calam-
tiles when they befall us.
Following out the line of my thoughts,
when assumed that | had the power and
was compelled to drown in Lethean waters
certain acts, | found | could not spare
errors which call forth regrets, mistakes
which teach US wisdom, or the sorrows
which soften character and make us sensi-
bic of the sympathies which give beauty
to the intercourse of life. As | had to
obliterate twenty events, | found that
could best spare the successes or triumphs
which had only served to impart courage
in the battle of life and had but little in
tiuence in forming character 1t is true,
that wherever and whatever we are, We
can SO deal with the past that we can make
it give up to US virtue and wisdom. We
can, by our regrets, do more than the
alchemist aims at when he seeks to trans
mute base metals into gold, for we can
make wrong the seed of right and right
eousness; we can transmute error into
wisdom; we can rake sorrow bloom into
thousand forms like fragrant flowers.
These great truths should not only give us
contentment with our positions, but hope
for the future. The great question, what
are we, presses itselfupon us as we grow old,
or flashes upon us when our lives are cut
short by accident or disease Within
these walls, but few days pass without that
question being forced upon the minds of
some who have reached the end of lies
journey. Surely, it should give hope and
consolation to all to feel that they can, in
the solitude of the cell, or in the gloom of
the prison, by thought, by self-examina-
ton, make the past, with its crimes, its
which they can lift themselves into higher
and happier conditions. This work of
transmitting evil into good, is duty to be
done by all conditions of men, and it can
be wrought out as well in the prisoners
cell as in the highest an most honorable
position, for when you do this. you work
by the side of the Almighty. All human
experience accords with the higher
teachings of religion, that holds out
hope to men who feel regret for
every evil act. wish to call your minds
to that amazing truth, that there is a
Being who rules the world with such
beneyolence, that he enables weak and
erring mortals if they will, to turn their
very SORROWS and errors into sources of
happiness.
We have many theories in these days in
which men try TO tell us how the world
acting upon fixed laws-has made itself !;
that 1t goes on by progress that regards
nothing but certain rules of advancement,
regardless of all other considerations save
their own irresistible, self-compelling prin-
ciples. But here we have truth not only
given us in Holy Writ, but proved by our
experience, that mental regret will convert
a material wrong into blessing, or, if the
offender wills, it will make the same hun
dredfold more hurtful if he rejoices in his
wrong -doing, or hardens his heart against
regret. Materialism, evolution, pantheism,
or any Of the theories which deny the
government of an intelligent God, are all
phases of fatalism, and are confuted by this
truth, that we can, by conforming to His
laws, which demand repentance, convert
evil into good, or by violating them make
evil tenfold more deadly and destructive.
We can, by our own minds and sentiments,
change the influence of material events,
and change the action of laws which gov
ern the world. If man, with all his
weakness, can do this, it can only be by the
aid of higher power which shapes, directs
and regulates.
know that what | have said is but an
imperfect statement of great truths, COM
pared with the teachings of the pulpit
which you hear every Sunday As my
purpose is merely to speak to You of what
l have learned in the walks of life, | can
give you from this narrow field but partial
views of great truths. They may be of no
value to you, but trust you will accept
them at least as proof of my sympathies
with your condition and sorrows, for if any
ambition fingers in the breast of him who
speaks to you now, it is that he may be
the friend and adviser of the erring and
wrong-doer. He has been taught by self
examination and the study of Others, that
we all belong to that class, and that we
owe to one another any aid we can give to
our fellows when they fall by the wayside